4 Ingredients author to share her favourite recipes

Best-selling author behind the hugely successful 4 Ingredients cookbooks, Kim McCosker, will share three of her favourite recipes when she takes to the stage at this year’s Moreton Bay Food + Wine Festival.

The culinary genius, who has taken the world by storm with her quick, affordable and easy dishes that consist of four common kitchen ingredients, will host two cooking demonstrations on The Kitchen Stage when the festival returns to the Woody Point foreshore from August 23-25.

“I am definitely going to make a one pot wonder because it resonates with so many people,” Kim says.

“This will be a quick and easy dinner to get you out of trouble when you're time poor, have had a long day at work, and your family is milling around the kitchen asking, “when will dinner be ready?”.

“It might be something as simple as a chicken tikka masala, where you use two kitchen staples from your pantry, then you add whatever veggies you have got left in your crisper.

“The next dish is one of the most popular and shared recipes in Australia – banana bread.

“It is consistently one of the top 10 Googled recipes in Australia year in and year out, and highlights the delicious bananas that are grown right here in South East Queensland.

“There are a few sneaky little tips that I will share while making the banana bread, but you will have to come down to the demo and see it unfold there.”

Kim says her final recipe will take many people from the crowd on a trip down memory lane.

“Cheese balls have always been popular, and is something a lot of us grew up eating," Kim says.

“I know making a cheese ball will spark a lot of interest and conversations from people in the crowd, and it will be one dish I think people will make over and over again.”

While using four ingredients can be challenging, Kim says every dish needs to have a hero ingredient.

“It’s easy to make something tasty when you have 14 ingredients, but it’s harder when you only have four, so that’s why it’s important every dish has a star ingredient,” Kim explains.

“You have to be really clever with the four ingredients and the combination they strike together, which is what you will learn when you see me up on stage.”

Festivalgoers can catch Kim live on The Kitchen Stage on:

Friday, August 23 from 3.05-3.50pm

Saturday, August 24 from 11.35am-12.20pm

Kim will also be available for a special meet and greet with her fans after her cooking demonstrations.

A festival favourite

This will be Kim’s fourth time appearing at the festival, which she says is one of her favourite events to attend every year.

“I love the location, I love the layout of it, and I love how every year something new and different is added,” Kim says. 

“I love how the festival caters for everyone. No matter what skillset you have, or what level you are starting your culinary journey on, you will find something that appeals to you.

“I met a lovely husband and wife at last year’s festival and the husband said to me, I was "the one person he had been waiting to see all day” because he thought he could make one of my recipes.

“It was nice to see that he was eager to learn more about cooking and try some easy recipes.

“I always tell people, use the 4 Ingredients cookbooks as a base – they will give you everything you need to make a delicious and simple meal, but that doesn’t mean you can’t expand on those recipes and add in other ingredients you love.”

New cookbook to hit the shelves

Kim released her first 4 Ingredients cookbook in 2007, which was then followed by 4 Ingredients 2 in 2010.

Her first two books were a hit with home cooks and have since been named the two biggest selling cookbooks in the last decade.

She has now written more than 30 cookbooks, with each recipe explained in an average of four sentences and made using one cup, one tablespoon and one teaspoon – trailblazing an era of simplified cooking in the kitchen.

Kim’s next book, which will be out in time for the festival, will focus on helping people living with diabetes.

“My new book is called 4 Ingredients More Diabetes,” Kim says.

“Every day, 306 Australians are diagnosed with diabetes, such as Type 1, Type 2, or gestational diabetes.

“We worked on this book for about 18 months with the nutritional team from Diabetes Australia in Victoria.

“We had to make sure every recipe was endorsed by Diabetes Australia and met their criteria because each dish had to have a certain amount of calories and a certain amount of sodium, for example.

“The new book will be out before the festival, and we will have a few copies for sale at a little pop-up stall after my cooking demonstrations at the Moreton Bay Food + Wine Festival.”

Quick Q&A with Kim

Q: What were some of your favourite meals as a kid?

A: My mum’s savoury mince, apricot chicken, and her amazing sponge cake. To this day, I still love my mum’s sponge cake. My boys tell me they love my sponge cake, but I don’t think mine is as good as hers.

Q: What is your guilty food pleasure?

A: I love fine dining. I love food made by someone else. I know I can’t do that every day, but it is my absolute guilty pleasure. Whenever we are celebrating an anniversary, birthday or big milestone, we will select a beautiful restaurant and it will become something we really look forward to.

Q: In your household, do you do the washing up or does someone else?

A: We have a family rule that if you cook, you don’t wash up.

Q: What is one food combo that sounds weird to others, but you love?

A: Steak and Vegemite. When you brush a little bit of Vegemite onto your steak just before it is done, it adds the most glorious flavour and kind of wraps around your steak as it melts.

Q: What is your go-to food when you want to treat yourself?

A: Sponge cake. It is a dish that has a real connection to my childhood and all the different stages of my life. My mum still makes me a sponge cake every birthday. This year, she made a sponge cake with licorice icing, and last year she made one with fresh cream and strawberries. So, for me, a real treat is having a piece of homemade sponge cake.